The expansion of the World Wide Web allows consumers or others interested in acquiring and compiling information from a number of sources a vast new opportunity to quickly gain access to multiple information providers. Unfortunately, what often results to a consumer is information overload because there is as yet no uniform way for a consumer such as a potential buyer to access multiple web sites at once, obtain the information they are interested in, and have the information presented to them in a compiled and easy-to-understand format.
For example, a user wishing to purchase automotive insurance on the Internet might choose to use one of a number of Internet search engines to search for the text "automobile" near "insurance." Such a search conducted at the time this provisional application is filed yields over 9,000 hits to different URLs on the Internet and that number will only increase.
Using currently available Internet tools, a user's only option is to visit all 9,000 of these URLs or to select URLs at random in order to seek individual price quotes or information about car insurance. In many cases, the information sought by the user might not exist on the URLs accessed, and the user will be left with the option of sending an individual e-mail message to any websites from which the user wishes to request that information.
What is needed is an automatic supra-search engine that allows a user either to select from a number of standard topics or to select from a number of standard queries or to compose his own questions, and which will then use the resources available on the Internet, including proprietary and commercially available search engines, to browse the Internet and seek answers to the questions posed by the user.